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LIFE OF CHARLES HALIDAT. CV
the day after. He owed none of these brilliant qualities to
association with the class he belonged to ; they were the
product
of self -education. But whence the motive ? Was
it not due to the period when the faculties of him and his
brother were opening ? May
it not be traced to the
influence of the era of the French Revolution ? This great
event awakened and stimulated the minds of men, with the
hopes of a new and better world.
Added to this were the agitations of the Irish rebellion
and of the Union, which also powerfully exercised the
faculties and passions. Though he and his brother were
T
then too 3 oung for public life, the houses they frequented
were full of the men of that day and their conversation had
its influence upon their minds.
Be the cause what it may it is an honour to this city and
country to have had such a citizen as the author of the
present work, and especially to the Merchants of Dublin, a
body he was proud to belong to.
For myself I count it a happy event of my life to have
of such a man and I
enjoyed the friendship and intimacy ;
am glad to think that as Editor of his literary remains my
name will in future times be thus associated with his.
OF THE MAPS IN THIS WORK.
Mr. Holiday's original design was to write a history of
the port and harbour of Dublin, with a view to trace the
progress of improvement in the navigable channel of the
Liffey, but he was so seduced from his course by a search into
a history of its Scandinavian antiquities, that there would
have been left no monument of his proper object only for
his essay or paper on Sir Bernard de Gomme's map of the
port and harbour of Dublin in 1673.
One can only regret, considering the ability and research
he has displayed in this short essay, that he was not able,
through the late period
of life when he entered on this
study, to accomplish as well his original design as that